


The Old Man

by ArachneLovesMe



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-28
Updated: 2014-06-28
Packaged: 2018-02-06 15:06:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,655
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1862313
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArachneLovesMe/pseuds/ArachneLovesMe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Don’t believe what your parents tell you." That’s the first thing the old man always said to new kids who questioned his stories. "Most angels are actually dicks. And the things that go bump in the night, most of those are real too.""</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Old Man

"Don’t believe what your parents tell you." That’s the first thing the old man always said to new kids who questioned his stories. "Most angels are actually dicks. And the things that go bump in the night, most of those are real too." He’d say it seriously, and maybe a couple of the older kids would scoff and ask what he knew about anything. When that happened he’d give them this  _look_. I don’t know what it was about it, but there was something honest about those bright green eyes that spoke to knowing something far more than he was telling off hand. When the younger kids paled he’d shush them and tell ‘em that it was alright. because even though there were monsters there were always people to fight ‘em off. He called ‘em hunters. but everyone could tell from the way he said it it really meant heroes. And that’s the way we came to think about ‘em too.

His two favorite hunters to talk about were these guys called Sam and Dean. Brothers he said. The best hunters there ever were. He could tell endless stories about these two brothers driving all around the country in an old Impala wherever people needed saving; tracking and killing what most people didn't even know existed, fighting demons, sometimes even saving the whole world. He told the stories proudly, even if he did seem to get a bit sad and wistful. Like they were old friends he’d lost a long long time ago, even though they were impossible. His stories were always the grossest, coolest, most awesome stories for us kids. Like, there was this one time they had to cut off the heads of like a hundred vampires to get a magical gun that could kill  _anything._  He’d ham everything up, explaining the ‘ **shink-squelch-crack** ’ of the blade through the neck and the ‘ **thump** ’ of the head, until the kids were either giggling or gagging. The stories about shifters that left behind their skin were always the grossest, sometimes girls would tug on his jacket until he changed the subject. Spoilsports.

Of course, Sam and Dean weren't the only people he talked about. The coolest, wisest guy ever, was apparently named Bobby Singer. He had been hunting probably forever and had information on  _anything_  you’d want to kill. _Anything_! Even weird things like Okami (wolf-spirit-people that ate humans!) and Rugaru, and Wendigo… I mean, this guy could even tell you how to kill  _gods_  with just a few minutes of research through his enormous library. And if Bobby could tell you how to kill anything, then John was the one that could kill it. Apparently, he was the one that taught Sam and Dean everything they knew. Or a lot of it. John and Bobby combined to make one super-tutor in the art of killing supernatural things (and it was an art) if the old man was to be believed. There were others too, like Garth the guy that was practically a kid, just like us. Greener than grass when he first started but who…eventually… turned out to be an alright hunter. Then there was Jo, Ellen, and Ash, who weren't hunters exactly, but had a bar that was practically hunter-central where you could go for information or a job (code for a hunt) if you needed one and couldn't seem to find one for yourself. Rufus, who was gruff and grumpy but really loyal. Charlie, who was sort of dragged into the whole thing but helped Sam and Dean take down some of the craziest things they had ever fought, and so many others. Every single one of them put a glimmer of remembrance in the old man’s eye, there was sadness there too. Some of us who noticed wondered who they were based on. Who the man had lost and turned into legends. 

Not all of his hunters were human though. There was this one guy-- Castiel-- one of the only angels that wasn't a complete asshole, according to the old man. He rescued Dean from hell, after all, (How bad ass is that?! He went to  _hell_  and came back!) and then proceeded to become allies with them. The old man always seemed to get more distant when he was talking about him, almost as bad as when he talked about the time Sam had started hanging around with the demons. He was an angel. He was all this power (Grace. That’s what angel souls are called.) packed into a regular ol’ human body and he somehow stuck with the boys as they fought off the apocalypse not once but twice ( _TWICE_. SAM AND DEAN SAVED THE WORLD, TWICE! NO ONE EVEN KNEW IT WAS ENDING) and after. Once one of the kids asked why Castiel would stay with humans if he was an angel. The old man’s face twisted into a pained smile that wanted so bad to be a grimace. “I wish I knew, kid. I wish I knew.” He made an excuse about being cold or hurting too bad and went inside. No one asked about Castiel again after that.

I think the best part of his stories, was the fact that he would tell you how to kill the things he talked about-Even if you knew they weren't real-with such conviction that you could believe just for a minute that if a ghost  _did_  come after you, that you could leave a salt line to keep it away for a while, long enough to find it’s bones anyway. He didn't treat you like just because you were a kid you couldn't defeat your monsters. And maybe, just maybe, if some kids asked him how to draw devil’s traps, he’d grin and go into his tiny rickety trailer for some paper, the back of a bill or a scrap of a take away bag, and a pen. He’d come out with his tools and, carefully as his shaky hands could manage, draw the shapes that would catch a demon dead in it’s tracks. And maybe by the end of the first week we started listening to him half the kids in town had devil’s traps somewhere in their rooms and salt lines across their door. And maybe some kids asked their parents where they kept the borax after he told us about the icky, hungry Leviathan. And maybe some kids started taking lighters from friend’s parents so they’d be prepared if they needed to burn any bones.

He gathered quite the following after a few months. Every day he’d sit outside his trailer and start the crossword or open a book, if no one showed up he’d go inside after an hour or two. Normally though, an audience would slowly start to precipitate and when there were one or two kids he’d start telling the story for the day. More and more kids would show up until there were a dozen or more of us all listening intently as he explained close calls and twist endings. One day when he was looking at each of us in turn as he was re-telling the story about the Day Sam Bested The Devil someone said “Hey. Ass. Butt.” in time with him. That wasn't the strange part, that happened often enough. If a kid had heard a story enough times they would say the jokes with him and if they were close he’d ruffle their hair and continue. The strange part was the deep, rumbling voice that said it. The old man looked up, eyes full of terror and hope and stood up sharply, blanket dropping from his lap. old bones creaking. He staggered down the steps, kids in his way parting like a sea. “Cas?” He asked, more a breath than a word. 

"Dean." The man acknowledged. He was young, much younger than the old man, he had tufty black hair and the bluest eyes any of us had ever seen. A ripple of whispers went through the kids ‘did he just call him Dean?’ ‘did he just say Cas?!’ ‘as in, Castiel, Cas?!’

One of the braver kids stumbled forward to the pair who were now holding hands, the old man nodding acknowledgement to something the younger one had said. He tugged on the end of the leather jacket that the old man always wore, worn from decades of use, and piped up with a “Hey Mister. What’s your name?” when he broke his gaze away from the younger man to acknowledge the boy. (None of us knew why we hadn't asked before. He had always just been the old man with the stories. He didn't need a name.) He chuckled and looked back at the younger man, who nodded once. When he looked back it was if, for just a moment, you could see the man he had been so, so many years ago. Young and Handsome and Strong. “My name, son, is Dean Winchester.” He winked and smiled as he turned to walk away with the younger man as the realization of what he had said slowly settled over the kids in attendance.

He never did return after that. All the adults said that he had passed away, and he didn't have any family to give him a funeral. We all would have gone if there were, but we all knew the truth anyway. The old man hadn't really died. His Angel had taken him back to wherever hunters go when they get to leave.

Without the old man there, we older kids, the ones who had been listening the longest, took it upon ourselves to start telling the stories, including the one where the old hunter gets taken back by his angel. Now a days, if you ask any kid in Lawrence they could tell you how to kill any monster you wanted, and about the two boys and their angel who saved the world.


End file.
